In life, when we as believers have issues, be it financial, car troubles, our kids start acting up in school, grief in marital life or death, I hear it said often “Satan is busy”, or “that’s just the devil”. As quickly as we label Satan or dark forces as the source of the problem is as quickly as we toss the idea out of the window and point the finger at those people or places as the target of our counter attacks. I have to ask the question, Do we really know who our enemy is? And if so did we develop the habit of not applying that premise. If we believe the enemy to be Satan, why then do we forget to treat other members of the body of Christ and those who are not, in a way that shows we have that understanding? We gloss over the topic of Satan and his devices, making it somewhat unclear what we believe as followers of the Messiah because by doing so we show no real difference between the body of Christ and those outside of it when we do not address our battles properly.

Do we, as believers truly know that we are not wrestling against flesh and blood or do we feel we have to accept this ideology because it is in the bible and it says so? Well the reason it is hard to apply this perspective is because your opponent plays on stealth. If he can convince you that he is not there, then yes you will be pointing fingers all day at your husband, wife, kids, mother, aunt, manager, and the lady who works in aisle five who seems to always ring your groceries slow and has an attitude with you. Part of the reason why so many have rejected modern day Christianity is because the attitudes and poor behavior of the “Christians” who claim to understand Christ and his and our own collective enemy, Satan. It turns everyone away when believers fight with their neighbor, but tap the man on the shoulder in Church on Sunday and say “Jesus loves you”. Oh ye hypocrites.

Unconsciously we act as the co conspirator of our own demise when we don’t counter attack Satan and the kingdom of darkness only. Many unbelievers don’t believe in God, Satan or anything else biblical, so this part of my post is not directed to them, prayerfully those non-believing men and women can be fished in, but I am simply addressing the church because this in the only group who will say that Satan is the culprit. Our war is not with flesh and blood. I am not attacking your belief but serving as a firm reminder and encourager to get you to apply your belief to your actions. Don’t argue with a spirit. When you feel the attacks, your job as a man or woman of God is to go into your prayer closet and pray without ceasing 1 Thessalonians 5:17. “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places “. Ephesians 6:12

Satan does not play fair, he aggressively attacks and so should your counter attacks be… aggressive. Before you hit your manager with the clap back just simply save it. One day it will be the job and another day the car and then you look up and somehow all areas of your life are under attack and you are fighting everyone and everything in the physical. Put your energy on where it will be effective and on where the fight was initiated and that is in the spirit. As true followers of the Mashiach (Messiah), we must fully understand the Kingdom of darkness, and that a kingdom is comprised of many representatives both high and low ranking and everything else in between. This is why the full armor of God is a must have.  We have to exemplify more traits that not only show that we have that understanding but also that how we handle our trials is a reflection of that understanding. In a way we have been brainwashed by Hollywood we seem to think that unless a person is crawling up a wall that they are not being manipulated by darkness and demonized and this is simply not the case. Some of our attacks come in the form of an excess of pleasure, others are constant illness and poverty and for some a monster really is under the bed. However,  for the greater majority of us, it is the one person who we love who always manages to pushes our buttons or the one who consistently puts a bad taste in our mouths who is seemingly normal but irritating, that is truly under satanic manipulation.

The main key here is to recognize that both in the body of Christ and in the body of unbelievers, Satan is always attacking, his army does not sleep. They are waiting on us to become consumed  with all the distractions they are sending us and to be blissfully comfortable being ignorant of his influence. Satan has no allegiance to the light or to darkness which is why we have to know his devices so we will not help him harm us. With that said, address your “problems” with God and stay aggressively in prayer, stand firm in His truth and the result will be just as he has said … Resist the devil and he will flee from you, James 4:7